Praying with Scripture
God Speaks To Us First
This is the foundation of prayer. God
first speaks to us. This makes it possible for us to pray. He is
more concerned for each of us than we are for ourselves. God desires to
communicate with us. God speaks to us continually, revealing Himself to us
in different ways:
This is the mode of communication we are most concerned with in prayer.
He Invites Us To Listen
Our response to God’s first speaking to us
is to listen to what He is saying. This is the basic attitude of prayer.
How To Go About Listening
What you do immediately before prayer is
very important. Normally it is not something you rush into. Spend a
few moments quieting yourself and relaxing, settling yourself into a prayerful,
comfortable position.
In listening to anyone, you try to tune out everything except what the person
is saying to you.
In prayer this can be done best in silence and
solitude. Select a favorite passage from Holy Scripture, 5 to 10
verses. Put a marker in the page. Try to find a quiet place where
you can be alone and uninhibited in your response to God’s presence. Try
to quiet yourself interiorly. Jesus would often go up to a mountain by
Himself to pray with His Father.
In the age of noise, activity, and tensions like our own, it is not always
easy or necessary to forget our cares and commitments, the noise and excitement
of our environment. Never feel constrained to blot out all
distractions. Anxiety in this regard could get between ourselves and God.
Rather, realize that the Word did become flesh - that He speaks to us in the
noise and confusion of our day. Sometimes in preparing for prayer, relax
and listen to the sounds around your. God’s presence is as real as they
are.
Be conscious of your sensations and living experiences of feeling, thinking, hoping, loving, of wondering, desiring, etc. Then, conscious of God’s unselfish, loving presence in you, address Him simply and admit: "Yes, You do love life and feeling into me. You do love a share of your personal life into me. You are present in me. You live in me. Yes, You do"
God is present as a Person, in you through His Spirit, who speaks to you now in Scripture, and who prays in you and for you.
Ask God for the grace to listen to what He says.
Praying Scripture
Begin reading Scripture slowly and
attentively. Do not hurry to cover much material.
I
f it recounts
an event in Christ’s life, be there in the mystery of it. Share with the
persons involved, e.g. a blind man being cured. Share their
attitude. Response to what Jesus is saying.
Some words or phrases carry special meaning for you. Savor those words
turning them over in your heart.
You may want to speak or recite a Psalm or
other prayer from Scripture. Rally mean what your are saying.
When something strikes you, e.g.
- you feel a new way of being with Christ. He becomes for you a new way...you sense what it means to be healed by Christ.This is the time to..............pause.
- you experience God’s love
- you feel lifted in spirit
- you are moved to do something good
- you are peaceful
- you are happy and content just to be in God’s presence
This is God speaking directly to you in the words of Scripture. Do not hurry to move on. Wait until you are no longer moved by the experience.
Don’t get discouraged if nothing seems to be happening. Sometimes God
lets us feel dry and empty in order to let us realize it is not in our own power
to communicate with Him or to experience consolation.
God is sometimes
very close to us in His seeming absence. Read Psalm 139:7-8. He is
for us entirely in a selfless way. He accepts us as we are, with all our
limitations - even with our seeming inability to pray. A humble attitude
of listening is a sign of love for Him, and a real prayer from the heart.
At these times remember the words of St. Paul:
"The Spirit, too, comes to help us in our weakness, for when we cannot choose words in order to pray properly, the Spirit Himself expresses our plea in a way that could never be put into words.? (Romans 8:26-27)Relax in prayer. Remember God will speak to you in His own way.
"Yes, as the rain and snow come down from the heavens and do not return without watering the earth, making it yield and giving growth to provide seed for the sower and bread for the eating, so the word that goes from my mouth does not return to me empty, without carrying out my will and succeeding in what it was sent to do." (Isaiah 55:10-11)Spend time in your prayer just being conscious of God’s presence in and around you. If you want to, speak with Him about the things you are interested in or wish to thank Him for, your joys, sorrows, aspirations, etc.
Summary - the 5 "P’s"
Read aloud or whisper in a rhythm with your breathing...a phrase at a
time...with pauses and repetitions when and where you feel like it.
Don’t be anxious, don’t try to look for implications or lessons or profound thoughts or conclusions or resolutions, etc. Be content to be like a child who climbs into its father’s lap and listens to his word and his story.
When you finish, remind yourself that God continues to live in you during the rest of the day.
